38:24N 30:50W Headwinds again 100 miles to go
The Snark on The ARC
Ben Little
Wed 25 May 2011 05:23
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Hi there Folks,
Maybe our last blog at sea on this leg, with any
luck we will be into Horta tomorrow evening and too busy trying to find a berth
etc. The irritating thing is that we are so close and now the wind is
not behaving itself. The calm period forecast this afternoon turned
into 5knots of headwind which we motored into expecting the wind to change to
the North East. I did as planned shortly after sunset but
at change of shifts (1 am) we got a 30 degree wind shift so the wind is
coming directly out of the East where we want to go. It has come around a
bit now but we are still headed to our destination. This is the same
pattern we saw on our way into Bermuda. We could motor into it but frankly
we are down to our last in the fuel department and we want to save it for
the lat 50 miles and coming into port.
Something different tonight is that there were
3 boats around us as the sun went down so there is actually something to look
out for on watch at night. There is a catermeran which we keep pulling in
then they put the engine on and taking a more direct route and pulling away from
us. We have now left them well behind as they seem to have turned the
engine off for the night. We were passed this afternoon by a large yacht
under engine (circa 100 ft or more judging by he 5 spreader mast). The
third we have not managed to ID yet. Just as we came on watch a new boat
appeared in the East with very bright running lights or lots of them. It
then promptly vanished as I was reaching for the VHF and spot light to make sure
they had seen us. Then they re-appeared even brighter than before then
again as we finally realised they disappeared behind another cloud, it was the
moonrise catching us by surprise. It would have been quite embarrassing to
attempt to hail the moon on the VHF I suspect they don't monitor
16.
Variety at meal times is up despite the lack of
fresh goods the addition of fresh fish to the menu is generally a positive
edition (for most) we had another larger Albacore for lunch today. Quentin
and I had Sushi as an appetiser while Mike and Chris abstained. The good
news is that if the gas runs out we will have an alternative to pot noodle made
with the hot tap. It was delicious and very glad we had the pickled ginger
etc to go with it. I cooked the rest and judging by the fact we almost ate
the whole fish it went down well. Chris made it clear he had had enough
fish for one year, doused the lot with ketchup and called first dibs on the
crunchy pot noodle for lunch if we caught another fish.
With all the unhelpful wind (WW what is this all
about?) we have been amusing ourselves with some pub quiz questions (also from
the WW) which are much appreciated, we teamed up to make the best of it but only
managed 3 out of 10 on the sailing song section, we did far better on our
knowledge of cheese (perhaps surprisingly 8/10) and song lyrics (6/10) and
finally film title anagrams (7/10). All in all a good result with no
ability to check up on Wiki!. The arrival sweepstake seems all but won by
Chris due to the crappy wind we now have. As I sit below warming up after
3 hours upstairs it looks even crapier judging by our course and
speed.
I'm going to grab 30 mins of zzz while Quentin and
George manage the helm. George is doing very well steering on the wind
close hauled despite the changes in direction and speed, thanks to James for the
suggestion wind does work much better than bearing at most points of
sail.
Bye for now happy sailing and hope to see a few of
you in Horta before we leave.
Ben and the Crew of The Snark
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